As for Una, it would be difficult to describe her struggle between confidence in his innocence, and apprehension of the law, which she knew had often punished the guiltless instead of the criminal. 'Tis true she attempted to assume, in the eyes of others, a fortitude which belied her fears, and even affected to smile at the possibility of her lover's honor and character suffering any tarnish from the ordeal to which they were about to be submitted. Her smile, however, on such occasions, was a melancholy one, and the secret tears she shed might prove, as they did to her brother, who was alone privy to her grief, the extent of those terrors which, notwithstanding her disavowal of them, wrung her soul so bitterly. Day after day her spirits became more and more depressed, till, as the crisis of Connor's fate arrived, the roses had altogether flown from her cheeks. Indeed, now that the trial was at hand, public sympathy turned rapidly and strongly in his favor; his father had lost that wealth, the acquisition of which earned him so heavy a portion of infamy; and, as he had been sufficiently punished in his own person, they did not think it just to transfer any portion of the resentment borne against him to a son who had never participated in his system of oppression. They felt for Connor now on his own account, and remembered only his amiable and excellent character. In addition to this, the history of the mutual attachment between him and Una having become the topic of general conversation, the rash act for which he stood committed was good-humoredly resolved into a foolish freak of love; for which it would be a thousand murders to take away his life. In such mood were the public and the parties most interested in the event of our story, when the morning dawned of that awful day which was to restore Connor O'Donovan to the hearts that loved him so well, or to doom him, a convicted felon, to a shameful and ignominious death.